J. C. Moore

Alright, I’ve arrived at my ultimate thesis on Digger. In the quoted tweet, I mention that the film doesn’t necessarily portray Kenny as evil as everyone is saying. And the responses I received were mostly people doubling down. Here’s a quote from Inarritu, about Digger, that gets at what I mean: “Reality is very complex, contradictory, ambiguous… it would be very nice if reality were black and white, but it isn’t… There are no good guys and bad guys — that is the reality.” Digger shows us the fiction where things are black and white, where the are clearly bad guys. Iñárritu then uses Hannah to call out the lack of action from people who were living then (which is us, now). Then uses Curtis to note that the play doesn’t truthfully capture the reality of who the characters were. Then uses Kenny to make the point about reality being complex, contradictory, and ambiguous. The film’s reality, the present in which the play is happening, is purposefully complex, contradictory, and ambiguous. There are aspects that point towards Kenny being a nefarious techtator that facilitates a dystopian surveillance state. There are also aspects that point towards him not being like his uncle. The simplest character development tool in storytelling is the “pet the cat, kick the dog” moment, where a story signals if a character is supposed to be good/bad by how they treat another character, animal, child, etc. Digger has Kenny “pet the cat” by helping with Hope. That’s good! But he helps by potentially using intelligence technology to surveil her. That’s bad. But the film never confirms that Kenny really did help or really did surveil because it wants the ambiguity. Just like with the outside world. People see drones fly by and leap to “dystopian surveillance state”. But it’s also a world with air pollution so bad that they have a warning system about whether or not it’s safe to breathe. The city streets show clear signs of weather-related disaster. It may seem silly, but the drones could be part of the monitoring system for weather events and air quality. And the soldiers on the streets? The US government often has the national guard assist after natural disasters like hurricanes, floods, and wildfire. Iñárritu is purposefully vague with these things because the vagueness is a direct response to the heightened good/evil, right/wrong binaries in the play. The film tells us “both things are true”, but people dismiss it because Kenny delivers the line. Many don’t want to believe the film would say anything meaningful from the billionaire character, especially after the depiction of Digger and how clearly self-serving Digger’s speech to parliament is. But that’s the point. The play = simplified concepts of the world. The film’s real world = far more contradictory. If you’re still viewing the play’s real world in the same binary terms as the play, that’s too narrow of a reading. Especially if you think the film is saying art is pointless. It can be both futile and important. Everything ultimately comes back to “now what?” Regardless of good or bad, now what? If art is futile, then what? And if it isn’t, then what? What next action do you take?